We sat down for an exclusive interview with Joshua Poole, playwright and star of historical farce ‘Monarchs Anonymous’.
This show runs from 23rd-28th June at The Other Palace, London – Tickets here
Monarchs Anonymous is such a brilliant concept – what first sparked the idea of putting some of history’s most infamous rulers into a modern-day therapy session together?
Monarchs actually starting during the pandemic as an online webseries, filmed on Zoom and uploaded on YouTube- initially it was a fun way to get actor friends to perform together. Myself and my co-writer Nadia Devereux asked what could bring a group of historical monarchs to a Zoom call together and the answer was therapy! The idea has evolved so much and it’s so much fun to perform it on a stage.
As both the playwright and a performer in the show, how different has the creative process felt compared to working solely as an actor?
A great question, I think as an actor and writer together you have to be able to switch hats in an out of the rehearsal room. If you wear the writer hat while acting you risk worrying about the play as a whole from within the scene and your head isn’t in it. And vice versa too, if I’m thinking about playing Charles in the writing room, I would just give myself all the good lines.
Charles II is such a colourful historical figure. What drew you to playing him specifically?
It’s easy to imagine the caricature—the foppish ladies man in a wig but he’s actually very complex and lived a very varied life for a monarch. He led armies as a teenager and became an exiled fugitive as a young man. He then restored the monarchy and his 25-year reign is a huge constitutional shift for the nation and remains one of the most important periods for our country.
There’s a growing appetite online for history content that feels accessible and entertaining. Why do you think audiences are connecting with history in this way right now?
Information is so easy to access now and short form video means that it’s very easy to entertain yourself and so our view of history is very unique. I think people have always loved the mysterious nature of stories from the past. They say history is like another country so we have a wanderlust for it; our love for history remains but the way we access it is always changing.